A Battle Joined: Part Three
by Pete Tzinski
Summary: For more episodes of Khitomer, go to www.members.tripod.com/st-khitomer/index.htm!


The USS Khitomer, after destroying the Jem'Hadar warships that had  
been pursuing it beyond the Anteries system, glided free of the asteroid field and  
swung through the Bolias system, coming to a stop amidst the Federation task  
force.  
A task force that was now four ships smaller.  
Captain Bradly J. Edwards still felt guilty over the loss of the four  
ships that had accompanied the Guardian-class warship in an attempt to ambush  
a Jem'Hadar patrol that had turned disasterous. The patrol had been equipped  
with modified shields that had proved to be too much for the starships. The  
Khitomer had escaped only because of her superior design.  
What if he hadn't retreated? What if he had ordered the ships to scatter  
once in the asteroid field? What if the Khitomer, instead of running, had remained  
behind to occupy the Jem'Hadar ships while the less advanced Starfleet vessels  
ran? What if he had ordered the whole fleet in, instead of just taking a few ships...?  
A thousand 'what ifs' plagued him during the quiet voyage back to join  
the fleet. Everyone was busy around him, analyzing data, repairing systems,  
running simulations, and he was left alone with his thoughts.  
He'd met the captain of the Gorgon--one of the ships destroyed--once. He  
had been a dignified British man with a heavy-set frame, receding hairline, cheerful  
gray eyes, and a charming smile. He had a family. A wonderful wife, two beautiful  
children, and a German Shepherd named 'Scotty' --after the famous engineer. They all  
lived happily on Mars. He would've retired from active duty in a little less than a year.  
Commander Christopher Hobson sat down in his chair to the right of Edwards  
with a groan, stirring the blond-haired captain out of his reveree. "Those Jefferies Tubes  
were most definitly not designed to be 'user friendly'." He stated, massaging his left  
knee.  
Edwards tried to push all thoughts about the fallen ships from his mind and said,  
"Oh?" inquiringly.  
"Crawling around in 'em will wreck havoc on your knees for sure." Hobson replied  
with a slight grin on his face.  
Edwards gave a small smile in return then stood up and moved forward to  
stand beside Ensign Krod Zetan who was manning the helm.  
The Bolian looked back at him briefly, then faced forward again.  
"We've reached the fleet, sir." He informed Edwards.   
"Good." Edwards looked back across the bridge at Lieutenant Commander  
Robert Radisson who manned the security console. "Mr. Radisson, contact the   
captains of the other ships. I want to meet with them in our conference room in  
one hour."  
Radisson got up off the ground where he had been lying over an open  
access panel, working on the weapons relay and said, "Aye, sir."  
"I'll be in my Ready Room," Edwards told Hobson as he walked toward  
his office.   
He wanted to study the sensor reading they had gotten on the Jem'Hadar  
ships before the other captains arrived...

If you don't see an Applet here, I pity you.  
  


-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

"A Battle Joined: Part Three" 

By: Pete D. Tzinski 

Guest Stars:  
Lieutenant Laurel DePaul - Lieutenant Menyez -   
Lieutenant Rodrequiz - Doctor Xonne -   
Captain Cox   
&   
Captain Joshua 

With Special Guest Star:  
Captain Jean-Luc Picard  
  
  
  


"Sir, I assure you: My calculations are correct!" Lieutenant Laurel DePaul  
seethed through clenched teeth, trying to keep her temper in check as Lieutenant  
Commander Dk'myr'chi--the Khitomer's Chief Engineer--stood towering in front of  
her, examining her figures for the precise alignment of the warp field coils with  
a furrowed brow and perpetual frown.  
The Human/Gorn hybrid insisted on double-checking all of her work. He  
had to examine everything she did as though her skills were, in his eyes, those  
of a first-year cadet.  
And not only that, he did it all with a bad attitude. Dk'myr'chi seemed to  
be in a permenant bad mood that only worsened when something broke down  
or went wrong. DePaul was beginning to understand why they had accepted  
'volunteers' for the position of assistant to the chief engineer on a ship as advanced  
as the Khitomer. Very few officers would actually serve with someone like Dk'myr'chi.  
Fortunately, DePaul had the patience of a Vulcan. Had she not, she would  
have long since booted the green-skinned, stockily built, man out the airlock and  
taken over his position herself.  
He shrugged and tossed her the PADD. "Looks good. Go ahead, Lieutenant."  
She considered snapping at him--telling him that 'of course' her calculations  
were correct! She wasn't a junior-grade cadet after all--but knew that he would  
only snap back.  
Instead, she sighed quietly to herself and shuffled off with a small "Yes, sir."  
This was going to be a very long shift...  
  


***  
  
  
  


"Thank you for coming, Gentlemen. Sorry if this seems rather sudden, but we  
haven't got a lot of time." Edwards said, a note of urgency in his voice, as he strode  
briskly into the Khitomer's conference room and threw himself into his seat at the head  
of the table. His presence instantly brought order to the room. The other captains, who  
had been standing around talking among themselves quietly, fell silent and took their  
places around the obsidian-colored, oblong conference table. All eyes were on Edwards,  
waiting for him to speak.  
He didn't keep them waiting long.  
"I don't know if all of you were briefed, but there were rumors that the Dominion  
had developed a new type of shielding for their ships. They were only rumors before,  
but now, we've confirmed them...and it cost four starship crews their lives."  
"Captain Cox, USS Agammemnon," One middle-aged man identified himself.  
"I was briefed on the theory of the absorbtion shields. How exactly are we supposed to  
defeat a ship equipped with it?"  
Edwards nodded, glad the question had been put forth, "That's why I asked you  
all here," He said, addressing the group as a whole, "Because I don't know. These ships  
are commanded by Jem'Hadar. Now there's no way we can provoke Jem'Hadar into  
losing control and chasing us into the asteroid field, or making a careless mistake. They're  
brutal, efficient, and nearly perfect fighting machines."  
Moral dropped another ten points, lower than it had already been. The captains  
were murmering among themselves now.  
Edwards let them talk for a minute.  
"However," He said, raising a finger for emphasis, "I said they're nearly perfect.   
Rest assured, they are not."  
"Captain Joshua, USS Mandrin," Another man spoke up, "What's their weakness  
and how can we exploit it?"  
Edwards replied, "The Jem'Hadar, you'll have to remember, are all CLONES. They're  
all created using similar templates, and trained using nearly identical programs. For  
all intents and purposes, they're just clones."  
He leaned forward, resting his forarms on the table as he pressed his palms together,  
fingers outstretched, "They all use the same strategies in battle. Once you learn what  
to look for, you can read them like a book. They become completly predictable. That's  
the Dominion's one weakness and they know it. That's why they've started using different  
programs to educate their cloned soldiers. But since they've only recently begun, they  
won't have very many--if any--new Jem'Hadar out here. I fully understand these Jem'Hadar.  
I know their strategies, their mind-set, and their train of thought. I have got them figured  
out. We can defeat 'em by being smarter than they are, better than they are, and totally  
unpredictable.  
"That's why the Federation'll win this war. Starship captains are not cut from a  
couple of identical molds. Each and every single captain is different. What you learn   
with one captain will be useless against another because they're totally different. That's  
why we'll win the war, and that's why we'll win this battle."  
There was complete silence for several minutes as everyone sat, digesting  
his words. Even Edwards himself was suprised as the eloquence and forcefulness  
with which he had spoken. He hadn't realized how important it was to him personally  
to win this fight until now.  
Finally, Captain Cox stirred and broke the silence, speaking for all of them.  
"Then let's start brainstorming, shall we?"  
  
  
  


Dk'myr'chi groaned tiredly as he sagged down slowly on his bunk, not even  
bothering to take off his uniform or his boots. He closed his eyes and was just starting  
to drift off to sleep when his combadge chirped.  
Muttering angrily to himself under his breath, his tapped it and said, "Yeah, what  
is it?" With a nasty edge in his voice.  
There was a slight pause, then DePaul said, "Sorry to wake you, sir. We've got  
a problem down here and I think you might want to come take a look at it."  
"DePaul, it's my experience that problems are the one thing that never go   
away. It'll be there in six hours and so will I--fully rested."  
"True, but I figured you would want it repaired before we go charging into   
combat again."  
"So you fix it!" Dk'myr'chi snarled.  
"Sir..." DePaul sounded very exasperated.  
He grumbled to himself for a long moment, then growled"Oh, alright. I'll be there in five minutes, okay?"  
"Thank you, sir." She signed off.  
He got up again and stormed out of his quarters, heading toward engineering,  
a proverbial storm cloud hanging over his head.  
  
  
  


"Alright, what is it?" He demanded as he burst into Engineering. He   
immediatly found DePaul and zeroed in on her.  
She was kneeling beside an open access panel, peering inside with  
Lieutenant Rodrequiz beside her.  
When DK'myr'chi came up to them, she stood and gestured toward the  
access panel. "See for yourself."  
He dropped two one knee and put his head inside conduit alongside  
Rodrequiz.  
Immediatly, the horrid smell of burnt circuts hit him. He saw a huge  
gap where there had once been several dozen important circuts. The entire  
area surrounding it was charred and blackened.  
"The system exploded," Rodrequiz provided, "When we attempted to  
use it, the faulty circuts overloaded."  
"We were lucky this time," DePaul put in.  
"Lucky!?" Dk'myr'chi demanded, pulling his head out of the conduit and  
standing nose-to-nose with DePaul. Rodrequiz got up, standing beside the both  
of them, uneasily watching the confrontation. "A system literally explodes, vaporizing  
itself, and you say were lucky?"  
She held her ground, matching his glare with one of her own. "Yes, sir. We're  
lucky because it didn't explode while we were in combat. We're lucky it wasn't  
a vital system. The Khitomer will be able to run easily without this one. We're lucky  
that it didn't hurt anybody or take out any other systems. Does that satisfy you...sir?"  
They stared at each other, neither wavering, for almost a full minute. Everyone  
had fallen silent, watching the showdown. Rodrequiz shifted nervously.  
Finally, Dk'myr'chi averted his eyes to glare at the damaged system and  
and stalked over to a workbench were he snatched a tricorder up and began   
working furiously on it.  
He looked up at them and said, "Alright. Good job, DePaul. I..uh...I guess you  
were right in calling me. I.......apologize....for snapping at you."  
She nodded once, deciding not to press the matter.  
"Good," He said. "Here's what we'll do."   
He pointed at Rodrequiz, "I want you to manually check all the systems that  
are near the warp core. Last thing we need is some explosion blowing the core and   
taking us along for a joyride to Kingdom Come."  
"On it." Rodrequiz said as he started off.  
"DePaul," He continued, "You and I are going to start checking the rest of the  
vital systems. Then we'll move onto the less-important ones. Get a tricorder and start  
re-programming it to detect the parameters of these faulty circuts. You start over there,  
I'll start here, and we'll meet in the middle. Snap to it."  
She grabbed a tricorder as she hustled past a workbench and made her way  
across the room.  
With all hopes of sleep gone from his mind, Dk'myr'chi tiredly scrubbed his  
eyes, then forced them to focus on the tricorder.   
  


***  
  
  
  


"...But the good news is that the majority of the main systems don't have the  
problem. The bad news is that a LOT of the lesser systems do. I've got my people tearing  
them apart and fixin' the problem now."  
Dk'myr'chi concluded his report, then leaned back, tilting his chair, as he waited  
for Commander Christopher Hobson--the Khitomer's First Officer--to process this.  
He finally nodded, brow furrowed to match his troubled frown. "Thanks for   
bringing this to my attention, Lieutenant Commander." Hobson said, "This is  
certainly a problem. Do we have spares for all these circuts?"  
Dk'myr'chi shrugged, "Most of 'em. The rest, we can just jury-rig. Rest-assured,  
we'll get everything up and running."  
As Hobson got up and meandered over to the large window in the Captain's Ready  
Room, he shook his head, "I can't believe the construction teams were so sloppy. I  
would understand a few systems--that's usually the case on a new starships--but this  
many...?"  
Dk'myr'chi shrugged, "The Khitomer was a rush job, Commander. The goal  
was to build a very tough battleship as quickly as possible. That involved taking some  
shortcuts."  
Hobson turned back to look at him, "I thought you were in charge of the  
construction project?"  
"Not in charge, just working as one of the main engineers. I came in late  
on the project too. Had I been in on it from the beginning, we wouldn't have had this  
problem."  
"Hmmmm," Hobson said as he turned toward his thoughts again. He grinned  
slightly when he saw Dk'myr'chi stifle a yawn with the back of his hand, "Tired?"  
Dk'myr'chi nodded, "Yeah. I haven't slept in..oh, lessee..almost three days."  
"Why don't you go get some sleep?" Hobson suggested.  
"Nah," Dk'myr'chi said as he got up and headed for the door, "Who needs it  
anyway? I've got work to do. See you around, Commander."  
And with that, Dk'myr'chi walked out, the door sliding shut behind him.  
  


***  
  
  
  


Captain Cox stood up and spoke. He'd been nursing an idea for some time  
now. Either he was ready to present it, or he had a comment.  
"What if they don't have all of their ships equipped with this absorbtion shield? I  
mean think about it: We have the ability to make Octahedron shields--that much is  
evident since the Khitomer's been equipped with it--but that doesn't mean that  
all of our ships have them. In fact the Khitomer's the only one. Maybe the Dominion  
has the ability and maybe they've equipped a few ships, but I'm willing to bet that  
most of their ships aren't such equipped."  
Edwards shook his head, "Doesn't matter. It'll only take a few of those ships  
to stop us. When the last task force attacked, they had two Galaxy-class starships  
that attacked one of these ships simultaneously. One was destroyed. The Jem'Hadar  
ship survived."  
Cox said, "If we could draw the specially equipped ships off, we could take  
out the normal ships, then focus on the modified ones."  
"Good idea," Captain Joshua said from the other side of the table, "But what  
about the ship that has the modified ships chasing it? How could they defend themselves  
against those ships? Normal shields won't hold forever against the Jem'Hadar weapons."  
It would be a suicide mission. Everyone knew it. Everyone was talking among  
themselves, trying to decide who would volunteer to die.  
Maybe no one would have to....  
Edwards stood up, "You're right. Normal shields can't take Jem'Hadar weapons  
for long. However, the Khitomer's Octahedron shields can."  
"I forgot about that!" Joshua exclaimed, a smile lighting his face. "The Khitomer  
can draw them off, then we can destroy the remaining ships."  
"What a minute," Another captain spoke up from down at the other end of the  
table. "We're forgetting Captain Edwards' words from earlier. Remember, he said that  
the Jem'Hadar couldn't be provoked into chasing us into the asteroid field. They won't  
chase us anywhere else, either."  
The moral--which had just recovered the ten points it had lost earlier--dropped  
past that and continued to plumment.  
Edwards slumped back in his seat, "I had forgotten I'd said that. Sorry,   
gentlemen."  
Captain Jean-Luc Picard spoke from the opposite end of the table for the  
first time since the meeting had started.  
"When the Borg invaded the Enterprise-E awhile ago, I lured two of them  
into the holodeck where I activated a Dix--that is--a 'program' I often spend time in.  
"Now, this program is based in the early twentieth century--the nineteen  
twenties, if I remember my history correctly. The sidearms back then were projectile  
weapons. When the Borg came for me, I disengaged the holodeck safties and used  
a rapid-fire projectile weapon--a machine gun, I believe it was called. Since the safties  
were disengaged, it succeeded in killing the two Borg."  
Everyone looked at each other in silence, wondering what exactly this had to  
do with the current topic.  
Picard continued, "If you'll remember, the Borg have adaptive shielding--one of  
the reasons we have such difficulty defeating them. Since their shields are designed to  
stop energy, they become invincible after a certain number of them are killed.   
"Projectiles aren't energy, so they cut right through the Borg's shields as though  
they weren't there and killed them."  
"Ohhhh," Edwards breathed, comprehension dawning on him, "Projectiles..."  
Cox smacked the flat of him palm on the table, "That's it! That's perfect! It'll work  
against the Jem'Hadar's fancy shields too! Jean-Luc, that's brilliant!"  
"Whoa, whoa....slow down, wait a minute." Joshua said, "We don't have  
machine guns lying around, you know. Even if we replicated them, they wouldn't  
help much against even the Jem'Hadar's hull."  
But this didn't dampen the moral which had just skyrocketed.  
"We don't need machine guns!" Cox said, "We can make projectiles from...from..."   
He stopped to think for a moment.  
Edwards had been doing the same. Suddenly he looked up, meeting eyes with  
Cox who had been following the same train of thought he had. Their eyes locked and,  
in and instant, they both confirmed the idea without uttering a single word.  
"Think it'll work?" Edwards wanted to know.  
Cox replied, "It should. Assuming they don't dodge."  
"They couldn't dodge that many. And if we do the proper calculations, we can  
set dozens--or even hundreds--of 'em hurtling before we grab a couple and direct them  
closely."  
"Excuse me," Joshua said, "Would someone mind explaining this for those of  
us who aren't telepathic?"  
Rushed, Cox explained the idea to Joshua and the other captains.  
"We use our tractor beams and send as many asteroids as possible hurtling  
toward the inner system. Then we grab a few and personally drag them in-system and  
hurl them right at Jem'Hadar ships. Their shields won't stop a projectile, and an asteroid's  
usually big enough to severely damage--if not destroy--a Jem'Hadar ship."  
"Excellent idea," Joshua said. Picard nodded in agreement.  
Edwards stood up again, "Then let's get to work, shall we? Thank you for  
coming, gentlemen, but I think we should all get to work preparing our ships for  
battle. Good luck. We're gonna need it."  
Edwards turned and strode out, heading for the bridge to begin implementing   
the plan.  
  


***  
  
  
  


"Think it'll work?" Edwards asked Dk'myr'chi, looking up at the older man from  
his seat on the bridge of the Khitomer.  
Dk'myr'chi, who was standing, in front of his Engineering console pressing buttons  
as he listened to Edwards unfolding his plan, nodded, "It should. Assuming they don't see  
us lugging a hundred-odd asteroids toward them, they won't be able to get out of the way  
of all of them, and even if they do, it'll take out their orbital defense platforms.  
Edwards replied, "Good. I want you to find several large asteroids and tag 'em  
for the Khitomer. Commander Hobson, I want you--"  
" 'Scuse me," Dk'myr'chi interrupted, "Before I go back to Engineering and get  
to work, I've got a couple of ideas of my own."  
Edwards said, "Shoot."  
"First," Dk'myr'chi began, "If we removed the detonation circuts from our photon  
torpedos, they'd essentially become projectiles."  
"Good one," Edwards complimented him, "How soon can you have our photons  
modified?"  
"We've got a lot of 'em on the Khitomer. It'd take me days to modify them all. I  
can have a bunch of 'em ready soon, though."  
"How much is a bunch?" Edwards wanted to know.  
"More than a few, less than a lot." Dk'myr'chi supplied. At the exasperated look he  
got from Edwards, and the stifled grin from Radisson, he added, "I can't give you  
an exact number, Cap. All I can tell you is I'll have some ready for you by the time we  
need 'em."  
"Okay." Edwards dropped the matter, deciding it probably wasn't wise to  
pursue it any further. "What's your second idea?"  
In response, Dk'myr'chi pulled out his tricorder and began scanning the bulkheads  
of the bridge. When he found what he was looking for, he flipped his tricorder shut and  
pulled the panel off, revealing a mess of circuts. He pulled a charger off his belt and connected  
it to the proper socket. Squeezing the handle, he started feeding the system power. He locked  
the charger on, then back away from the opening, motioning for the other officers to do so  
as well.  
They did, and just in time. The system emitted a high-pitched squeal, then the  
circuts seemed to explode, vaporizing themselves and throwing licks of flame out onto the bridge.  
Fortunately, Dk'myr'chi stamped them out, then sprayed the system with his  
extinguisher.  
"What're you doing!?" Edwards demanded, louder than he had meant to.  
"Demonstrating my idea." Dk'myr'chi replied.  
"You better have a good explanation, mister," Edwards growled, crossing his arms  
across his chest in a clear sign of annoyance.  
"I do, I do. Trust me." Dk'myr'chi gestured toward the now-blackened inside of the  
system. "This was one of the faulty systems that I told Commander Hobson an' you  
about. The reason they've been exploding is when we try to use them, they can't handle the  
energy that's being fed into them. They overload and explode, usually vaporizing themselves  
the way this one did."  
"Okay," Edwards said, still not looking very happy. He didn't like having a Chief  
Engineer who blew things up to make a point. Especially when it was parts of his ship.   
"I'm with you so far. Go on."  
Dk'myr'chi continued, "Now, think about the concept of the Jem'Hadar's shields."  
Radisson piped up, "They absorb energy, shunting some of it into their systems,  
then draining what's not needed back into space." He supplied for everyone on the bridge.  
"Right," Dk'myr'chi said, "Now standard circuts work on the same principle. Most  
systems can absorb quite a large overdose of energy before they blow out. That's why we  
don't explode when we pass through even a mild energy storm. These circuts are weaker  
than the normal ones, so they can't take as much. Hence the reason they explode. The  
Jem'Hadar shields do the same thing."  
"Oh, I get it." Ensign Zetan said, turning his chair around to face the others. "So  
what your saying is if we could pour pure energy into the Jem'Hadar's shields, they'd  
eventually overload and give out--"  
"--and the ships would be left vulnerable." Edwards finished the thought. "Could  
you possible modify the deflector to give off a focused beam of energy?"  
"It can be done. I figured I should get your permission before trying it, though."  
"Good," Edwards nodded, "Now if we can just keep you in that habit,  
everything'll be fine. Get on it, Dimitri."  
Edwards turned toward Zetan, "I want you to find those asteroids for us to  
tow, Mr. Zetan. I think Mr. Dk'myr'chi will have his hands full for present."  
"Yessir," Zetan replied, turning forward and setting to work on his controls.  
Dk'myr'chi nodded once to Edwards, then turned and strode into the turbolift,  
heading downward, toward Engineering.  
Hobson went back over to Radisson's area and resumed his work inside the  
equipment trunk of the weapons system. He did NOT want those circuts to explode  
in the heat of battle.   
Radisson set to work prepping the weapons systems, readying them for   
combat.  
Edwards left them to their work. He got up, walked into the turbolift, and  
descended into the bowls of the ship.  
  


***  
  
  
  


Beep!Beep!  
"Come," Commander Zack Toyle said, limping out of the bedroom and into the   
living room to greet his visitor.  
The door slid open and the shilloueted frame of Captain Edwards could be  
seen standing there. He stepped inside the pilot's quarters, the door slid shut behind him,  
and the sihllouet vanished, replaced by the good looking captain of the Khitomer.  
"Hi," Toyle said, "What's up?"  
Edwards couldn't help but smile tiredly. The strain of the last thirty hours   
showed in his face, "Right now, everything."  
"What can I do for you?"  
Edwards replied, "Commander, we're going into combat in about an hour. Are  
you fit to fly? We need you out there.""  
Toyle snapped a mock salute, "Ready and eager, Cap'n."  
"You sure?" Edwards pressed, "I don't need you passing out mid-flight and getting  
yourself--and possibly someone else--killed."  
"It won't happen." Toyle said, "I swear."  
"Good." Edwards seemed to relax slightly before Toyle. "Thank you Commander.  
Good luck out there."  
Toyle nodded thanks, and watched as Edwards turned and let himself out.  
  


***  
  
  
  


Edwards was walking down the corridor of the Khitomer, away from Toyle's   
quarters and toward Sickbay when he walked into Doctor Xonne. He hadn't even seen  
the Vulcan Doctor walking down the corridor, so lost in his thoughts was he.  
Xonne had been carrying a crate down the corridor and, when he walked into  
Edwards, he dropped it.  
The top had been poorly sealed and split off from the main body, spilling the  
crate's contents all over the deck.  
"Terribly sorry," Edwards gushed, "I didn't even see you. Here--let me help you  
pick this mess up."  
"Thank you, Captain." Xonne replied, "Most kind."  
Together, they knelt down and started returning Xonne's personal effects to the  
crate.   
"Is Sickbay ready for battle?" Edwards asked. This way, he wouldn't need to  
go down to Sickbay to check on it, as he had been planning to.  
"Yes, sir. Doctor Woods is a very experience Doctor. She has wheeled out the  
extra beds, replicated extra blood, and prepared her entire staff. Sickbay is fully prepared."  
Xonne replied.  
"Good, good. Again, I'm really sorry I--" Edwards broke off as he picked up a  
long flat wooden box-like item. It was hollow with a checkerboard pattern across one  
side. He opened it, confirmed his supicion as to its nature, then looked up at Xonne and  
asked,   
"Do you play chess?"  
"Yes, Captain. Quite a bit. Do you?"  
"Yes!" Edwards exclaimed, suddenly forgetting all about the upcoming battle.   
"Whenever I can! I haven't had a chance to play in awhile because I can almost never  
find anybody who still plays 2-D chess."  
Xonne nodded once and accepted the repacked crate from Edwards as they  
stood up. "We shall have to play sometime." He said.  
"Most definitely," Edwards grinned once more, then, with a nod, strode down the  
corridor, heading for the bridge.   
  
  
  
  


His good cheer was lost when he emerged, replaced with the hardened, cool,   
attitude of one who had faced many a battle and knew what to expect.  
"Report," He demanded as he walked across the bridge and alighted in his  
command chair.  
Hobson spoke up from his chair that was to Edwards' right.  
"We've found several large asteroids and tagged them for pickup by the Khitomer.  
We're currently setting the others moving toward the inner system."  
"Good. ETA?"  
"Ten more minutes, sir."   
"Great job, folks. Dk'myr'chi," He said as he turned his chair around to peer  
at Dimitri who was hunched over his Bridge Engineering console, "Are the photons  
ready?"  
"Thirty of 'em are, Cap'n, with more being made all the time."  
"And the deflector dish?"  
"That'll take a little longer. We're trying to find circuts that are strong enough  
to conduct a power flow of the magnitude we need without burning out. Ain't easy,  
but we'll get it up."  
"Good work, Dimitri." Edwards grinned, "This'll teach the Dominion to think they  
can be more creative than we can."  
That got a chuckle from everyone. Edwards let the laughter ripple through the  
bridge, hoping it would help release some of the nervous, pent-up energy that everyone  
seemed to be stewing in.  
Then, the atmosphere generally lighter on the bridge, the slingshotting of the  
asteroids seemed to proceed faster--although Edwards assumed it was just a   
figmant of his imagination. In almost no time at all, the ten minutes were gone, the  
asteroid field was now moving inward toward the center of the system, seeming to  
be closing like a noose, and the Khitomer, now towing three massive chunks of  
rock, was gliding in-system.  
The Jem'Hadar had already seen them coming and were making   
preparations of their own. Before the Federation task force could get the jamming  
beacons in place around the inner system, the Jem'Hadar had gotten a distress  
call out.   
  
  
  
  


The tense silence filled the bridge again, and Edwards knew that no  
joke that he could crack would dispel it this time.  
Zetan was glued to his long-range sensors, hunched over them as though  
he were hoping to personally pounce on the Jem'Hadar when he saw them.  
"Incoming!" He yelped a minute later, "Two--no, three!--Jem'Hadar warships  
inbound. They're launching their fighters!"  
"Alright," Edwards said, leaning forward in his chair, "This is it. Sound   
battle stations. Red alert. Mr. Radisson, aquire your targets. Dk'myr'chi, get  
those photons primed and in-position."  
He slapped his badge and said, "Commander Toyle, scramble your  
fighters."  
  
  
  


"Awcknowledged," Toyle said shortly, cutting the transmission. He slapped  
a large red button that was on his desk, in his office, just outside the main hanger.  
Red lights flared to life, klaxons screamed, and all the doors leading into  
the hanger opened. Racks of uniforms slid out of their places in the wall and hung  
waiting for the pilots to grab them. Charging lines started to dissconnect themselves  
from the Pheonix fighters. The two round doors slid back in their trenches, revealing  
the black abyss of the launch tubes.   
The eleven pilots of Pheonix Squadron boiled out of two doors on either side  
of the hanger and ran toward their fighters, grabbing their flight suits and helmets as  
they ran. Somehow, they managed to climb into their suits while hopping across the  
hanger toward their fighters without tripping. It was a skill that came from long years  
of practice.  
Toyle bolted from his office, slapping his computer into standby as he  
ran. He had already been wearing his flightsuit, the jacket unzipped. All he had  
to do was zip up his jacket and grab his battered helmet before leaping into his   
newly repaired and re-painted fighter.  
The paint job was dazzling, Toyle had to admit. Streaks of flame blossomed  
at the nose and seared their way across the hull before fading out just behind the  
cockpit. Bright red stripes ran along the sides. On each wing was a beautifully  
painted Starfleet Delta with five Pheonix-class fighters in the middle of a starburst--  
the logo of the Pheonix squadron.  
As if the wailing klaxons weren't loud enough, the engines of the fighters  
began coming on-line. The noise doubled, then redoubled as every pilot brought   
his or her fighter up to full readiness. As Toyle strapped himself into the cockpit of  
his fighter and pulled his helmet on, sealing it into place, he flicked a series of red  
switches. The red lights on his board immediatly flashed green as his fighter   
climbed to full readiness. The rumbling of his engines added to the din.  
Then came the launch.  
As a kid, Toyle's parents had once taken him to Cony island--one of the  
few remaining amusement parks on Earth. They had spent the better part of two  
days sampling the rides, trying the games, and munching happily on such delightful  
snacks as a feathery pink stuff that was called 'cotton candy'. Toyle had seen this  
massive, twisted set of steel girders rising above the park, surrounding and towering  
over it like some sort of strange spider web. Upon inquiring about it's nature, he had  
learned that it was a popular ride known as a 'roller coaster'. He had begged his parents  
to let him ride it--just once!--and they had finally given in to his persistant nagging.  
He had been strapped into a seat in one of the cars with a bunch of other  
excited people, and then the ride started. It clacked its way slowly up a track, and  
Toyle had groaned, assuming it would be some incredibly boring ride. Idlly, he had  
wondered if it was supposed to be some sort of tour of the park.  
They had reached the top of the track, and Toyle realized with a rush of  
fear that it seemed to drop straight down! The car plummeted over the edge,   
screaming in descent as it picked up more and more speed.  
Toyle had screamed at the top of his lungs, terrified, but his scream was  
stolen away by the wind. The bottom of the fall could be seen now. Toyle had visions  
of the car hitting the bottom at these speeds and shattering, killing everyone inside. These  
visions were followed closely by his life which soon flashed before his eyes.  
But the bottom came and the car managed to cling to the tracks as it tore  
through twists and turns, flying through loops and tearing around corners so fast, Toyle  
thought they would fly off.  
When the ride came to an end, he climbed out on shaky legs, needing to be  
partially supported by his father's strong hands.   
But that evening, he had lain awake, going through the ride again and again  
in his head, reliving the joy and the thrill that had sat just below his fear. It was  
incredible! And for some odd reason, the fear made it even better. He had ridden  
the coaster again the next day--four times actually--unable to get enough of it. It was  
like a strange addiction to him.   
And, over the years as he had grown up, he'd come back to that park to ride  
the coaster every couple of years, still loving it and screaming like he had when he had  
been a little boy. His joy of the speed and the fear and the terrifying drops had led him  
to take up sky-diving, then atmospheric-diving, then an old sport called 'bungey jumping'.  
He had flow shuttles like a madman, putting them through stunts that had never been  
designed to perform.  
Every time he stared down the black abyss of the chutes on the Khitomer, and  
flet the lurch as his fighter started moving slowly toward it, he felt the same fear mingled  
with joyful anticipation as he had when he was a child. He still loved the speed, the fall,  
and the terror.  
His fighter was catapulted into the tube and flung out into space with terrifying  
speed. The only reason, that Toyle could think of, for the speed was so that an enemy  
couldn't shoot down the fighters as they emerged from the chutes. It was the only thing  
that made sense to him.  
The moment the fighter cleared the Khitomer's shields, the joystick went  
limp as control was turned over to him. He clutched the stick and tapped it gently  
to the left, swinging his fighter around to meet the incoming Jem'Hadar fighters.  
Every fighter in the Pheonix squadron had a brilliant pain coat--no two alike.  
Each was done specifically as the pilot wanted it, each to his personal tastes.   
In sharp contrast, all the Jem'Hadar fighters were a dull grayish-brown and  
shaped like ugly beetles. They were certainly fast and manuverable, but incredibly  
ugly.  
With practiced ease, Pheonix squadron fell into a perfect formation as they  
tore toward the approaching enemy fighters. The Jem'Hadar ships mirrored them and  
dropped into a formation of their own.  
Toyle tapped his targeting computer and aqcuired a target lock on the nearest   
Jem'Hadar ship. He tagged it, making sure his squadron mate wouldn't all go for the  
same fighter. Now they would know to target a different ship.  
The moment the two squadrons came into weapon's range of each other,  
weapons flashed out, lighting up the blackness of space. None of the phasers hit  
their intended targets, though, as both squadrons were in the process of breaking  
formation and coming about to track their respective targets.   
Toyle didn't bother to fire, seeing no point in wasting a shot on empty vacuum.  
He pulled the stick back, toward his chest, and looped around, watching on the HUD  
as the red blip that indicated his target swung slowly from the ast sensors to the fore  
sensors.  
Soon he didn't need the sensors.  
As his agil fighter swung around, he was soon able to see the Jem'Hadar fighter  
with his naked eyes. The bug-like ship was harassing Lieutenant Joe "Maniac" Klevenski,   
one of Toyle's squadron-mates.  
Despite his nickname, Klevenski was a very cautious, ruthlessly efficient fighter.  
It was rare that his target ever escaped his sights long enough to tell the tale.  
The Jem'Hadar was a lot closer to Klevenski than Toyle was. He no doubt  
had a target lock already.  
Lacking time in which to use finesse', Toyle settled for simply squeezing his  
triggers, sending bursts of phaser energy rippling through space, barely missing the  
Jem'Hadar.  
As Toyle had hoped, the Jem'Hadar wheeled off of Klevenski's tail and started  
diving and twisting as he tried to evade the on-rushing Pheonix fighter.  
Toyle followed him through every twist, turn, dive, and angle, clinging to his  
tail like lint to a uniform.  
Then, the Jem'Hadar made a mistake.  
He leveled off.  
Not for long. Only for the briefest of moments. But it was enough. Toyle fired  
a burst of phasers into the enemy's manuvering computers--having  
studied the design of Jem'Hadar fighters, he knew exactly where they were-- and hit  
his target perfectly. Now all his could do was fly straight. A sitting duck, for all intents and purposes.  
Toyle's comm clicked to life and the hard voice of the Jem'Hadar pilot said.  
"Federation fighter: Surrender or prepare to be destroyed."  
Toyle shook his head, grinning slightly. He activated his comm.  
"Jem'Hadar, I'm thumbing my nose at you right now."  
"This is your final warning." The Jem'Hadar said, unfazed.  
"Yes it is." Toyle flicked his weapon's system over to Photons and acquired  
a target lock. "Up yer' tail-pipe, bozo."  
With that, he killed the comm and the, punching the trigger, killed the Jem'Hadar.  
The fiery debris continued to sail onward, flying on inertia alone. Toyle didn't hang  
around to watch it fly. He swung his fighter around in a loop and raced back toward the  
fight. He hadn't realized how far he had gone in pursuit of the Jem'Hadar.  
He could see many, many fighters, Jem'Hadar and Federation alike.   
He grinned again. So many targets, so little time...  
  
  
  


The Pheonix squadron was more than a match for any of the Dominion's fighters,  
Edwards decided, watching on his arm-panel as blip after blip vanished. Each blip represented  
a single Jem'Hadar fighter. When the battle had begun, there had been almost forty. Now  
there were only about ten or fifteen.  
A Jem'Hadar fighter broke off from the dogfights and dove toward the Khitomer,  
intent on strafing the larger ship. Edwards opened his mouth to point it out to  
Radisson when a single phaser beam blasted the fighter into a thousand small pieces.  
He closed his mouth again. Radisson knew his job, he admonished himself, there  
was no need for the Starship captain to tell it to him.  
A massive Jem'Hadar capital ship thundered into the thick of the fighters,  
weapons blazing away as it tried to pick the Pheonix-class ships off like gnats. The  
pilots with sharply-honed reflexes, dove away from the mighty ship, diving around the  
Khitomer for cover.  
The Khitomer easily provided it. Not only was it bigger than the Jem'Hadar  
warship, but it was tougher, stronger, faster, and better shielded. Radisson  
stopped shooting at the Jem'Hadar fighters and started pounding the warship with  
barrage after barrage of lethal energy.  
According to Edwards' display, the enemy warship was taking the   
barrages without suffering to much damage. It was one of the modified ones.  
"Radisson!" He bellowed, leaping from his seat and moving over to  
stand beside Radisson in an instant, "It's one of the modified ships! Bring the  
modified photon torpedos on-line! Release one of our asteroids!"  
The Khitomer lurched into motion, driving straight at the Jem'Hadar  
warship, still exchanging fire as it dragged its load of rock closer to the warship.  
"Steady....steady...." Hobson breathed from the tractor beam station he  
had assumed in the aft of the bridge. Then he barked to Zetan, "Now!"  
The Khitomer came to a sudden stop. In the same instant, Hobson snapped  
off the tractor beam on one of the asteroids.  
It continued moving, now unhindered by the tractor beam. It tumbled through  
space on a direct collision course for the Jem'Hadar ship.  
The Jem'Hadar reacted poorly and didn't move their ship out of the way in  
time. By the time they realized what was happening and started turning out of the way,  
it was far too late.  
The asteroid smashed into the Jem'Hadar ship head-on, hammering the modified  
shields with tons of force. They couldn't take the stress and blew out, leaving the Jem'Hadar  
ship defensless.  
Edwards stared without any hint of mercy at the enemy ship which was  
hanging there in space, cold and seemingly lifeless, the small chunks of the  
asteroid now peppering the hull.  
"Fire." He commanded.  
Radisson complied gladly.  
  
  
  


"Fire!" Toyle shouted into his comm, swinging his fighter around to   
aim directly at the battered capital ship.  
Every Pheonix fighter did the same. twenty-four phaser beams lanced out  
from all the fighters and cut into the Jem'Hadar ship's hull with a terrible fury that   
melted the hull-plates.  
Then the Khitomer joined the assualt, and the twenty-four phaser increased  
several-fold. The Jem'Hadar's hull armor didn't protect it for long.  
When Toyle saw explosions start to erupt from the enemy ship where phasers  
had not even struck, he punched his comm again, calling not only his squadron but  
the Khitomer as well.  
"She's going down! All ships, back away! Don't get caught in the explosion."  
Then, heeding his own advice, he twisted away from the dying ship, heading  
in the general direction of the Khitomer. The Guardian-class warship had ceased fire  
and was now backing slowly away.  
  
  
  
  


The Jem'Hadar ship erupted in a massive explosion. Chunks of hull were  
hurled out into space by the explosion where they would eventually settle down to   
join the asteroid field.  
Edwards threw one hand up to shield his eyes from the brightness of the  
blast as the ship's matter and anti-matter mixed.  
When he let his hand drift down, there was now empty space where the  
enemy ship had been.   
"Edwards to Toyle," He said as he settled back down in his command chair.  
"Toye here."  
"We're moving farther in-system. Can you take care of everything here?"  
"Sure thing, Khitomer. Good luck. We'll join you once we've mopped up the  
rif-raff."  
Edwards cut the connection and said to Zetan, "Resume course for Anteries."  
The Khitomer moved again with all due haste toward the inner planets where  
a fleet of Jem'Hadar warships and defense platforms awaited them.  
  


***  
  
  
  


By the time the Khitomer re-joined the other Federation starships, the  
asteroid field had already moved through the inner system and had taken out  
most of the defense platforms. Those that were left were damaged, usually severely.  
Unfortunatly, only a handful of Jem'Hadar ships had suffered any real damage.  
Fewer still had been destroyed.   
Now, the two fleets drove angrily at each other, each hoping to avenge the   
deaths of comrads.  
They met head-on, like the fighter squadrons had, but unlike the fighters,  
they did not miss when they fired their first barrage, nor did they need to loop around.  
The Enterprise-E veered off and attacked one wing of the Jem'Hadar's formation,  
followed by the USS Agamemnon. The two ships started singling out the the  
Jem'Hadar warships with modified shields. When they found one, they were release  
their asteroids, hurling the rocks into the enemy ships. More oft than nought, it destroyed  
the shields, leaving the ships vulnerable to attack.  
As Edwards quickly discovered, not all of the Jem'Hadar warships were   
modified. Quite a number of them were simply equipped with normal shields. There  
only seemed to be about ten or twelve modified ships. After the Khitomer, the Enterprise,  
and the other ships of the fleet had released their asteroids, that number was reduced to  
perhaps three.  
But three such modified ships were still enough to wreck considerable havoc  
on the fleet. Most of the Federation starships now attacked the un-modified ships, unable  
to combat the specially equipped ones.  
Captain Picard actually had a clever strategy. Edwards wished he had thought   
of it earlier. He set the Enterprise in a very fast spin on its axis so that the ship flipped over  
and over, gaining more and more speed. Then, he fired the escape pods. They careeened  
into space, moving as fast as a photon torpedo, where they usually hit a ship. Thankfully,  
most of them missed the Federation ships, although one smaller Defiant-class starship  
was hit once or twice.   
Edwards hit his badge, "Dimitri, are those torpedos in place?"  
"Yessir. Deflector dish'll be on-line in five or ten minutes."  
"Good work." He looked across the bridge, "Mr. Radisson, target those ships  
and open fire!"  
"Firing!"  
The repeating photon launcher was the first thing to come to life. Normally,   
when a photon torpedo fired, it ignited soon after it left the tube. As a result, a brief  
flare-up could be seen right after firing. With the ignition circuts and detonation   
sensors removed, however, something totally different happened. There was no  
flare-up, no sounds, nothing. Edwards didn't even know anything had been fired  
until a portion of one of the Jem'Hadar's shields flared as it took the impact of  
the projectile. Then it flared again. And again. And again...  
The repeating photon launcher did its job, sending torpedo after torpedo  
into the Jem'Hadar shields. They couldn't take it for long, though. Eventually, they  
collapsed and the ship was left vulnerable to the Khitomer's powerful phaser banks.  
The hull became charred and blackened as the Khitomer's phaser burrowed  
through the armor plating and touched the warp core. The ship erupted in flame soon  
after that.  
And so the battle proceeded. The Federation task force was reduced in numbers  
from sixteen ships to ten ships, then to five ships. The three remaining modified ships  
were brought down quickly with creative usage of photons, phasers, asteroids, and   
photons nets.  
The other Jem'Hadar ships were swarming on the Khitomer, seemingly  
ignoring the other four Federation starships. Edwards clung to his chair as his  
mighty starship bucked and rocked furiously beneath him. According to his  
monitors, the ships were everywhere! Radisson was firing phasers madly, but he  
couldn't take on all those ships at once.  
An idea came to the blond-haired captain. He recalled Picard's earlier   
manuver and shouted to Zetan above the red alert klaxons, "Mr. Zetan! Spin the  
ship around on our X-axis! Radisson, fire the remaining photon nets in two  
second intervals as soon as we're spinning!"  
"Aye, sir!" They replied simultaniously.  
The Khitomer came to a sudden stop, then started spinning around and  
around, faster and faster, so fast that Edwards couldn't watch the stars whirling  
past the viewscreen for fear of getting nauseous.  
"Firing!" Radisson shouted.  
Photon nets were flung from the Khitomer like stones from a slingshot.  
Intertia alone sent them flying through space at incredible speeds. Each and  
every one hit a ship, destroying it on impact.  
The remaining ships pulled back, not wanting to come to the same end  
their companions had. They didn't realize that the Khitomer had exausted its  
supply of photon nets.   
"Stop the spin," Edwards ordered, watching the stars slowly fall back  
into their proper positions.  
The four other starships flew at the Jem'Hadar ships, hammering at them  
with phaser and photons with unimaginable speed and unerring accuracy. Edwards  
was actually suprised when one of the Jem'Hadar ships turned to run.  
He bounded from his seat when he realized what the Jem'Hadar warship was  
doing: Trying to get beyond the jamming field so that it could transmit a distress call.  
"Mr. Zetan, get that ship!"  
The Khitomer disengaged from the fury of the fight and lept ahead with  
terrifying speed in pursuit of the lone Jem'Hadar warship.  
It drew closer with each passing moment, but not close enough. They  
couldn't gain fast enough. The enemy warship would be able to get a signal  
out before they could do anything. All Edwards could do was watch helplessly  
as the ship got slowly closer.  
Suddenly, seemingly from out of nowhere, a pair of phasers lanced out  
and hit the Jem'Hadar ship, followed by a barrage of photon torpedos. The  
enemy ship, already damaged from the fight, didn't last long, exploding in a ball  
of fire.  
Before Edwards could wonder, or ask Radisson who had destroyed the  
ship, the comm clicked on and a familer voice shouted at the top of his lungs,  
"WAAAAAAAAAAAHOOOOOOOOOOO!"  
At the same moment, a fiery-painted Pheonix-class fighter zipped   
past the viewscreen, heading back for the battle.  
Edwards grinned in relief as he sat back down in his command chair.  
He punched the comm, "Mr. Toyle. So good of you to join us."  
"Ya' were dwaddling," Toyle quipped, "Figured I'd just take care of it  
for you."  
"Thanks. Khitomer out."  
When they got back, they found three Federation starships sitting  
quietly in the midst of a debris field.  
The battle was over.  
The Federation task force had won, if just barely.  
"Aw man," Toyle groaned over the comm again. "See? Because of you,  
I missed all the fun."  
"Sorry. Return to the barn, Pheonix squadron. Party's over."  
  
  
  


Unfortunatly, the 'party' was far from over.  
Captain Picard's voice came urgently over the comm, his voice quietly  
the whole bridge instantly.  
"Captain Edwards, we just got a report from the surface. The Jem'Hadar have  
started killing everyone on the planet. They know they've lost, now they're trying to  
make sure there's no one left. We're beaming down our security personell, please  
send yours down."  
"Copy that." Edwards acknowledged the message, then looked expectantly  
at Radisson.  
The security chief was already in the turbolift.  
  


***  
  
  
  


"C'mon, people! Scramble! Scramble!" Radisson shouted as he pulled  
on his reflective silver vest and strapped his personal shield generator around his  
waist.   
The device was not terribly large or strong, but it could take several phaser  
shots. Radisson found the device to be very usfull. It was more shots than his  
skin could've taken, after all.  
He grabbed his phaser rifle from the long rack of equipment, then   
ran to the enterance of the shuttle, shouting again at the top of his lungs.  
"Hustle, hustle! C'mon, let's move! Hurry it up!"  
When the last few had scrambled aboard the shuttle, Radisson climbed  
aboard and was starting to seal the hatch when someone shouted, "Hold up!"  
Toyle came running across the bay, his helmet bouncing against his  
thigh from where it was attached to a clip on his belt. He too wore a shield  
generator and carried a small handheld phaser which he was clipping to his belt.  
He stopped in front of Radisson and said, "If you're going down there, you're  
gonna need the best pilot at the helm."  
Radisson nodded sharply and Toyle scambled forward into the pilot's seat,  
bringing the shuttle's engines to life by slapping a series of switches.  
Radisson sealed the aft hatch, then grabbed onto a pair of straps that  
ran down a portion of the wall. He pushed his arms through them, pinning himself to  
the wall by his shoulders.  
With a lurch, Toyle lifted the shuttle off the deck and punched the main  
drives, rocketing from the shuttlebay at speeds that were usually reserved only  
when one was in empty space.  
From Radisson's vantage point, he could see out the front viewport.  
Toyle whipped the shuttle around, dodging the pair of Jem'Hadar fighters that  
came up from the surface to meet him. He evaded them easily in the layer of clouds  
in the atmosphere of Anteries, then dropped the shuttle like a stone toward the surface.  
Radisson was wondering with just a touch of panic if Toyle had lost control of  
the shuttle and if they were now in complete freefall, rushing toward the ground at  
incredible speeds, when Toyle activated the thrusters, slowing the shuttle down until it  
stopped on the surface with a slight jolt.  
Radisson unstrapped himself and slapped the hatch controles. The hatch, with  
a hiss, slid open in time to admit between twenty and thirty security officers. Radisson  
and Toyle were the last ones out.  
They looked at each other, eye-to-eye for the first time. Then Radisson nodded  
once and switched on his shield generator. Toyle said, "Good luck," and did the same.  
Taking a deep breath, Radisson stepped out of the shuttle--  
--and straight into hell.  
There was rubble everywhere. Where building had once stood, there were  
now piles of stone and metal, mixed with human corpses. Plumes of smoke billowed  
up, hanging oppressivly over the entire grim scene. The smell of rotting flesh, combined  
with the acrid smell of ozone was truly horrid. Large black charred holes were marring the  
landscape everywhere.  
The security forces were already engaged in a battle with the Jem'Hadar  
opposition. Hefting his phaser rifle, he dove behind a large chunk of what had once  
been a street, took aim, and killed his first enemy.  
Two Jem'Hadar quickly zeroed in on his position and unleashed a hailstorm  
of fire into the slab of stone that he had ducked behind.  
Toyle, with a huff, slammed into the concrete block beside Radisson,   
grunting as he slammed into the slab. He'd running as fast as he could from the   
shuttle and hadn't been able to stop in time.  
"How's it look?" He panted.  
"Not good," Radisson replied, grimancing as the Jem'Hadar continuous  
fire burned a hole through the concrete, about two feet above his head. "As far as  
I can tell, there are forty Jem'Hadar right around this area, and lots more everywhere  
else. This is gonna be an uphill battle all the way."  
He turned away from the edge he'd been peering around and locked Toyle  
with a hard stare, "Now listen: Maybe you're hot in a fighter, but this is a ground  
battle. This is my area of expertise, so do what I tell you. No heroics, no dashing  
stunts, and nothing that risks the lives of any of my people...got it?"  
Had it been any other time, Toyle would've been wounded by his words,  
and probably would've shot some smart-mouthed remark back at the Security Chief.  
Now, however, he simply nodded, his eyes dead serious, his jaw muscles bunched  
tightly together.  
"Good." Radisson tapped his badge and said, "All Units report your positions."  
They gave him, each in turn, a series of seemingly meaningless numbers. Toyle  
recognized it as some sort of code, but couldn't decipher it. Radisson seemed to have no  
trouble making sense out of it.  
He paused in thought for a moment, then spoke into his badge again.  
"Alright. Units Two and Four, come about to the following coordinates," He  
gave another string of meaningless numbers, "And fire all phasers on these coordinates,  
on my mark." After giving them yet another string of numbers, he cut the channel,  
then looked at Toyle.  
"You take the left, I'll take the right."  
Toyole nodded and crouched by the left edge of the concrete, peering   
caustiously around the edge, waiting tensely for Radisson to give the order.  
Radisson tapped his badge again. He counted to five under his breath,  
then shouted, not only to units two and four, but to Toyle as well, "FIRE!"  
Toyle popped around the left edge of the crater and fired his phaser  
at the rock that their Jem'Hadar assualters were hiding behind. Radisson came  
up around the right side of the concrete and fired into the blackened, blown-out  
windows of one of the few buildings that were still standing. He hit his mark and  
a Jem'Hadar tumbled out of the forth-story window, pawing madly at his chest as  
he fell. He hit the ground like a limp doll and died. Radisson swung his phaser around  
to fire into one of the already weakened support struts of another building, vaporizing  
it, then firing on another. The building started to shake slightly, then began to creak  
and groan as the enormous weight of the building pushed down on the few remaining  
supports. It was only required to vaporize two more before the building collapsed with  
a loud crash. Bodies of Jem'Hadar and Cardassians alike were flung from the windows  
as the building fell. Below, on the ground, a pair of Cardassians panicked and ran  
from their cover, trying to get away from the building. One was crushed by the falling  
structer, the other was picked off by a phaser blast from someone in Unit Two.  
When the building hit the ground, it seemed to pop, like a balloon. Debris was  
hurled everywhere. Massive chunks of stone and metal crushed fleeing Jem'Hadar  
and Cardassian soldiers who were fleeing from the carnage. Much to Radisson's dismay,  
it also crushed several civilians who had been fleeing for their lives.  
The remaining enemies were easily picked off after the debris had settled.   
For a long moment, there was silence. Toyle peered slowly over at Radisson  
who looked back at him.  
"Think we got 'em all?" Toyle asked in a hoarse whisper. The smoke in the air  
seemed to be settling in his throat.  
Radisson nodded warily and stood up slowly. With his phaser held at ready,  
he said "Cover me" to Toyle, then moved out from behind the concrete.  
No one fired at him.  
With a sigh of relief, he tapped his badge and said, "All units: This area's   
secure."  
With a semi-chuckle, Toyle got up, coming around to the other side of the  
slab and wiping his face with one soot-covered hand.  
From behind other debris and out of ditches, the other Khitomer security  
officers came, some wounded, some not, running as fast as they could toward the  
shuttle. Radisson took off at a brisk jog, following his men.  
"Whoa, wait a minute!" Toyle shouted after him as he started running to keep  
up with Radisson, "Where're we goin'?"  
Radisson shouted back, "On to the next area. This whole planet's gotta be  
secured.  
Toyle groaned, "Not again," and ran faster than before.  
  


***  
  
  


"Captain," Zetan said, peering at his sensors with a puzzeled look that was  
rapidly turning to one of alarm and shock.  
"What is it?" Edwards asked, looking up from his panel which was displaying  
a sensor feed of the planet.  
"Sir, I've got readings on Dominion warships approaching this system at  
maximum warp."  
"How many?" Edwards stood up and strode over to stand just behind  
Zetan.  
"A lot." Zetan could only say. He gestured toward one screen which showed  
dozens--no, hundreds!--of red blips that were used to indicate Jem'Hadar ships. According  
to the sensors, most of them were capital warships, although there were a lot of smaller  
support ships mixed in.  
Edwards muttered a curse under his breath and tapped his badge, "Edwards to  
Toyle."  
"Toyle here," The fighter pilot returned. "S'up?"  
"Commander, we've got a Dominion fleet inbound. We need your services up  
here. Loop your shuttle up out of the atmosphere so we can beam you up. Radisson,  
please take over the piloting."  
The shuttle appeared through the atmosphere and Hobson said from Radisson's  
station, "Transport complete."  
The shuttle accelerated and dove toward the planet again, soon lost in the  
clouds of the atmosphere.  
"I'm on-board," Toyle said, "Should I scramble fighters?"  
"Not yet," Edwards replied, "I'll let you know when. Just have your pilots ready  
to go."  
"Copy that. Toyle out."  
Edwards sat back down in his chair, jaw set, eyes hard.   
"Mr. Zetan," He said in a low, dangerous voice, "Set course for that fleet  
and engage, maximum warp. Red alert. Battle Stations."  
He looked over at Hobson and said grimly, without the slightest trace of humor,  
"Here we go again."  
  
  
  


"Sir," A Jem'Hadar spoke to Scerioun, "I read one starship inbound for our  
position. They've seen us."  
Scerioun nodded cooly, "Name and class of the ship?"  
"It reads as 'Khitomer', a Guardian-class warship."  
Scerioun snapped his head around, looking sharply at the Jem'Hadar. "Are you  
sure?"  
"Yes."  
Scerioun said, "Open a channel to the fleet."  
He paused for a moment to give the Jem'Hadar time to implement his order,  
then said, "All ships. Target the incoming warship and attack. This is our primary target.  
Repeat: All ships, attack."  
The Jem'Hadar cut the channel and Scerioun ordered, "Drop out of warp. Charge weapons and raise shields.  
"We have them."  
  
  


"Sir," Zetan said, his eyes never leaving his helm, "The enemy fleet's seen  
us. They've dropped out of warp. Weapons are powering up, shields are coming  
on-line."  
"Maintain course and speed." Edwards ordered.  
"Sir?" Zetan turned to look disbelievingly Edwards, "We'll go right by them."  
Edwards shook his head, "No we won't. Drop us out right smack in the middle  
of their formation."  
Zetan stared at him for another moment, then said, "Uh...Aye, sir."  
  
  
  


"They're not stopping!" The Jem'Hadar informed Scerioun.  
Scerioun turned toward the direction the enemy ship was coming from. Although  
he knew he wouldn't be able to see it--it WAS going faster than the speed of light,  
after all--he suspected he knew the starship captain's strategy. They would see the  
Khitomer soon enough.  
"They will. Turn targeting computer toward the center of the formation. Inform  
the other ships."  
"Yes, sir."  
  
  


The Khitomer dropped from warp in the middle of the Dominion task force's  
formation and was immediatly under assualt from all sides. Luckily, Hobson had raised  
shields the moment they had abandoned the relative safety of warp. The ship lurched  
furiously beneath them, but sustained very little additional damage.  
"Return fire!" Edwards barked, praying these ships were not equipped with any  
type of modifications. There enough ships to deal with as it was.  
Phaser lanced out of the Khitomer from dozens of points. Photon launchers came   
to life, spitting photons out at the Jem'Hadar ships with lethal force and speed.  
The Jem'Hadar seemed taken back for a moment by the ferocity of the Khitomer's  
attack, but whatever advantage the Khitomer gained from the enemy's suprise was  
quickly lost. The Jem'Hadar responded with an assualt of their own.  
"Shields down to seventy-five percent!" Hobson reported, "We've taken out  
five support craft and two warships. Should I have our fighters launch?"  
Edwards considered it for a moment, then said, "No. They'll only get destroyed  
in this crossfire. They'll get their pound of flesh soon enough, rest assured."   
Zetan was spinning the Khitomer about, making the large ship seem almost  
to dance under his touch. Shots sailed through areas where the Khitomer had been  
as the mighty starship evaded barrage after barrage. Edwards was impressed with  
the Bolian's flying skills but chose not to say so. No reason to disrupt his concentration  
just to compliment him.  
"Dk'myr'chi to bridge!" The Khitomer Engineering Chief bellowed through Edwards'  
comm badge. "We've got a problem down here! We've found faulty circuts in the shield  
system! We've got to take it off-line or they'll blow out altogether!"  
"Dimitri, we'll be defensless!" Edwards barked back.  
"So make 'em mad, then run. Maybe they'll follow you. All I can say is if we  
take this pounding much longer without shutting 'em off, we'll lose our shields permenantly."  
"How long will it take you to repair them?" Edwards demanded.  
"We'll be able to do it in twenty minutes."  
"We don't have that long!"   
"Look, Cap'n!" Dk'myr'chi returned, "There's no point in arguing. Shut 'em off,  
or lose 'em altogether! It's your choice."  
Edwards ground his jaw in silence for a moment, then growled, "Fine. We'll  
warp out of here, then shut them off, okay?"  
"Good. Dk'myr'chi ou--" He was interrupted when there was a massive  
explosion sounded from behind him. Dk'myr'chi could be heard swearing angrily  
in several languages as he ran toward the source of the blast, ignoring Edwards' inquiries.  
Then he cut the channel.  
"Sir!" Hobson shouted, "The shields just fritzed out! We're defenseless!"  
Edwards snarled a nasty phrase most unbecoming of an officer and bellowed  
as he threw himself into his command chair, "Mr. Zetan, maximum warp, any course,  
now!"  
Zetan complied instantly, his reflexes already boosted by adrenilane. The  
stars quickly expanded to lines and the Khitomer tore into warp, fleeing the enemy fleet.  
The shots that had sought the Khitomer's precious hull found only empty space  
where the damaged warship had just been.  
  
  
  


"They have retreated," The Jem'Hadar First reported from behind Scerioun. "We  
can proceed on to the Anteries system."  
But as Scerioun looked out at the wreckage of almost a half-dozen ships,   
warship and support craft alike, he felt something strange. Something he had never  
felt before, in the entirety of his exsistence:  
Rage. Deep, burning rage, welling up in his chest. He scowled and  
said, "No. Pursuit course. Get them."  
"Our mission is to reclaim the Anteries system!" First protested, coming around  
his console stand beside Scerioun.   
"Our PRIMARY mission is to destroy the Khitomer!" Scerioun seethed. "And  
we shall worry about the Anteries system after we have destroyed that ship! Now  
plot a pursuit course and engage!"  
When the Jem'Hadar was slow to move, Scerioun actually screamed, "NOW!"  
The Jem'Hadar turned and strode back to his station, working the controles   
as he plotted a course.  
Scerioun found himself trembling with rage. In puzzelment, he raised his  
hand before his face, noticing how it was trembling violently. He clenched it tightly  
into a fist, and the trembling stopped.  
Most curious.... He thought. He had never felt such rage before.  
The stars began to rush by the warship as the fleet barged into warp after  
the fleeing starship.  
  
  
  


"They're pursuing," Hobson reported.  
Edwards ran a hand through his hair as he desperatly tried to think of a   
way to salvage his situation.  
An idea came to him.  
"Mr. Zetan, bring up the star charts for this region. We're around the   
Bloody Nebula, aren't we?"  
"Yessir," Zetan said, glancing briefly at a star chart that he had called  
up on one of his screens. "A couple of light years to port."  
"Set a course, maximum warp."  
Now Zetan turned, "Sir, may I remind you that the Bloody Nebula is  
highly dangerous. The usage of systems like shields, phasers, photons, or  
warp drive would cause it to erupt instantaniously."  
Edwards grinned, "Yes, it would, wouldn't it? Set the course."  
Zetan muttered, "Aye, sir." as he turned to face forward again.  
Hobson came down from Radisson's post and stopped by the  
side of Edwards chair. He said, "You're not thinking what I think you're  
thinking, are you?"  
"I am indeed."  
  
  
  


"They're altering course," The Jem'Hadar informed Scerioun.  
"Adjust course to match."  
"Sir, they're leading us farther away from the Anteries system. We  
may not be able to get back in time before Federation reinforcements arrive."  
"I'll worry about that. You worry about catching that starship."  
"Sir--"  
Scerioun fixed the First with a nasty glare, "This is not open to debate. Do  
what you are told."  
The Jem'Hadar straightened and said, reciting his programming, "Obidience  
brings victory!"  
Scerioun nodded, "Yes it does. And victory brings life. Never forget that."  
Scerioun, as he turned forward again, did not see the angry fire that  
burned in the First's eyes...  
  
  
  


The Bloody Nebula--so named because of its riddish hue, giving it a remarkable  
resemblance to blood--loomed closer, filling the viewscreen on the Khitomer, slowly blotting  
out the stars until only the Nedula could be seen. The Khitomer dropped out of warp   
several hundred kilometers from the Nebula, not wanting to risk hitting some strand  
of the Nebula's matter that had floated out into space.   
Edwards couldn't help but to admire the beauty of the massive  
celestial body, despite their grim situation. As a boy, growing up in Presque Isle,  
Main, he had been fascinated by such things. He room had been plastered, wall to  
wall--he had even hung some on the ceiling--with pictures of nebulas, stars, galaxies,  
planets, and other phenomenon. He would spend hours in the cool, crisp evenings  
of Main, gazing silently through a telescope at the stars, the distant planets, and  
sometimes--if he was really lucky--at a passing starship that happened to travel  
through the Sol system at half-impulse or less.  
"We're entering the Nebula, sir." Zetan reported, as mesmerized by the  
Nebula's kalidascope of shifting colors and patterns as Edwards was. "The Jem'Hadar  
fleet is following. They've powered down their shields and warp engines, but their  
weapons are fully charged."  
"What do you hope to gain by this?" Hobson asked. He was sitting  
again in his chair beside Edwards since they had taken the weapons off-line.  
Edwards rested heavily on one armrest, supporting himself with on  
arm. He leaned closer to Hobson and said, "We're faster than they are, even  
at Impulse. If we can get out of the Nebula before they do, we can fire and  
ignite the Nebula. They won't be able to survive that."  
Hobson nodded thoughtfully, "Not a bad idea, assuming they don't get  
trigger-happy and shoot at us while we're all inside the Nebula. If they do that,  
we're screwed."  
Edwards looked wryly at his First Officer, "Have you ever heard of a  
trigger-happy Jem'Hadar?"  
"Uh, no."  
"Neither have I. I don't think we'll have to worry about it."  
  
  


"FIRE!" Scerioun barked, "We're in range!"  
"Sir, if we fire now, we'll be destroyed as well!" The First protested.  
Scerioun was in a senseless fury. A part of him felt detached. He seemed  
to be watching the scene from above, watching as he trembled in rage, as his face  
turned red, and as his hands clenched into tight fists as his sides. He was parlty  
astounded at his reaction. He had never acted like this before!  
"Fire, curse you, fire!" He screamed, rushing over and pushing the Jem'Hadar  
First out of the way. He activated the weapons system and punched the firing button,  
sending a purple beam lancing out of his ship. It missed the Khitomer, but it struck  
a pocket of explosive gas which erupted in a furious explosion that started the   
dreaded chain reaction.  
Scerioun's rage seemed to melt away as if it had never been. He looked  
at the fire cloud for a moment, then said--whispered really--"Warp speed."  
When no one responded, he said louder, "Warp speed get us out--"  
And then, there was only fire.  
  
  


"What happened!?" Edwards demanded as the Nebula suddenly started to  
consume itself in fire.  
"One of the Jem'Hadar ships fired, sir!" Zetan yelped. "The Nebula's exploding!  
Without shields, we don't have a chance."  
Hobson was at Radisson's board again, "According to these readings,  
even WITH shields, we wouldn't have a chance."  
Edwards barked, "Emergency Transwarp, now!"  
Zetan, under any other circumstances, would have turned to inform his captain  
that the transwarp was not very safe. It had never been tested, and the Starfleet  
engineers who had equipped the Khitomer with the technology hadn't even been  
sure if it would work at all.   
Under THESE circumstances, however, Zetan complied instantly. He  
didn't even bother to plot a course and simply punched the 'Engage' button on the  
transwarp panel.  
There were special restraints built into every seat on every deck of the ship,  
and ordinarily, the captain was expected to announce the usage of the drive before  
it was activated, giving the crew time to strap in. Now, with a huge wave of blazing fire  
bearing down on them, Edwards didn't bother mentioning it to the crew, hoping they  
would have the sense to grab onto something after the ship lurched into transwarp.  
With a powerful surge of energy, the transwarp engines drained power from  
the warp drive and the non-essential systems, sucking power like a vacuum sucks  
air until it had built up enough energy to hurl the Khitomer with a mighty lurch into  
a transwarp conduit.  
They made it safely, but not before an arm of fire reached out and licked one  
of the warp engines.  
Leaving the Nebula far behind, the Khitomer dove into the silverly-colored  
transwarp conduit.  
Edwards was hurled from his seat by the lurch, unprepared for the sheer  
power of it. He hit the deck hard, blacking out for a moment. When he came to,  
he pushed himself up on his elbows and, upon seeing the silver conduit, sighed  
in relief.  
He lay there for a moment, commanding his heart rate, blood pressure, and  
breathing to come back under control.  
He pushed himself off the deck with a grunt, pulling himself slowly into his  
chair.   
In front of him, Zetan was pulling himself into his seat, shaking his head slowly  
from side to side and holding it in his hands.  
Hobson picked himself up off the deck, leaning heavily on Radisson's console.  
"Next time," He rasped, "Warn us before you do that!"  
"Next time," Edwards said, wincing as he head started throbbing, the result of his  
rather sudden and violent impact with the metal deck, "I won't do that."  
He cleared his throat and said a little louder, trying to sound authoritive again, "Status?"  
Zetan delivered the information to him. "Weapons are out, shields are still down, hull is  
weakened. Warp engines are off-line."  
The comm squawked from the arm of Edwards' chair and Dk'myr'chi's voice fought its way   
through a mess of static.  
"Dk'myr'chi to bridge. Hate to tell you this, Cap'n, but if we don't drop out of transwarp  
soon, we're going to lose power."  
"Dk'myr'chi, don't you ever have good news!?" Edwards grumbled exasperatedly.  
"Hmmmm," Dk'myr'chi thought for a moment, "Not usually. I got rid of this itch on my  
back that had been bothering me all day, though. Does that count?"  
"Dimitri..."  
"Sorry. You asked, remember. Anyway, drop out of transwarp, or we'll be dead in space."  
"Alright. Bridge out."  
  
  


The Khitomer dropped out of transwarp, suddenly appearing in another system.   
Edwards frowned and said, "Any idea where we are?"  
Zetan replied, "Hang on, sir. We'll find out as soon as I get our bearings.  
Hobson commented, "I hope we're in Federation space."  
From the beautiful blue orb that hung in front of them, four purplish Jem'Hadar attack   
ships came at the Khitomer, weapons powered up, shields ready.  
Zetan said, quite unnecessarily, "I don't think we're in Federation space."  
Edwards said, "I think we're in trouble."  
"I think you're right." Hobson confirmed.  
  
  
  


Edwards hit his combadge, his eyes never leaving the approaching   
Jem'Hadar ships. "Dk'myr'chi, can we jump to transwarp again?"  
"We can," Dk'myr'chi said, "But we wouldn't come out. We'd be ripped apart  
in our current condition. We barely made it through that last jump."  
"Warp then?"  
"No, the engines just went off-line. And I mean ALL the engines. Impulse too  
we're dead in space. I suggest you get comforterable 'cause we ain't going anywhere  
anytime soon."  
"Dimitri, we've got Dominion ships bearing down on us."  
Dk'myr'chi didn't reply right away.  
After a moment of silence, he said, "Then I guess we'll hurry."  
Edwards cut that channel and opened another, "Edwards to Toyle,"  
"Toyle here," The reply came back.  
"Launch, Commander. We've got company."  
"We're on our way out."  
  
  
  


For the second time that day, Toyle hit the red button on his desk as he  
ran by, pulling his flightsuit on as he went.  
His squadmates had been hanging around the bay, knowing they'd be ordered  
to launch soon. As a result, everyone was in their fighters and ready to launch in  
a little over a minute--a new record for the Pheonix squadron, Toyle realized.  
After being hurled out of the launch tube, Toyle tugged the joystick back  
to his chest, bringing his fighter around in an arc until he could see the Jem'Hadar  
ships. He leveled out, setting his shields double front and bringing his phasers and  
photons on-line.  
On either side of his fighters, his squad mates formed up. They dropped into  
a V-shaped pattern, reporting their readiness to Toyle one by one.  
Behind them, Toyle could see the Khitomer hanging limp in space. It was  
not a pretty site. He remembered how powerful and invincible the ship had looked a  
mere two days earlier. Now, with blackened spots on the hull and the warp engines  
dim, the ship looked beaten and wounded.  
And, up ahead, the Jem'Hadar ships looked alive and deadly.  
They came within range of each other and, as before, they exchanged their  
first barrage of fire. None of the shots connected this time either.  
Toyle chose his target and latched onto his tail like a leech. He followed him  
through every twist, turn, dive, and climb, then launched a photon torpedo into the  
aft shields of his ship.   
Squeezing his triggers, he pressed his advantage, pouring a steady stream  
of phaser energy into the enemy ship until its shields collapsed.  
The phasers made short work of the ship's hull. Toyle looped over the explosion,  
choosing not to plow through it this time, and picked another target.   
On his long-range scanners, he saw another two dozen fighter-class ships  
approaching the fight, eager to join.  
Toyle grinned.   
Bring 'em on.... He thought.  
  
  
  


"Alignment?"  
"One hundred percent." DePaul faithfuly reported.   
"Matter/anti-matter injection?" Dk'myr'chi asked.  
"Balanced out at 1 to 1." DePaul replied.   
Blowing a noisy breath out and running a hand across the top of his  
bald head, Dk'myr'chi said, "Then the warp drive should work!"  
DePaul shrugged, "According to everything here, it's on-line."  
"But it's not!" Dk'myr'chi said, shaking his head, "The engine system's  
completly down! Those readings are wrong."  
"Hey," DePaul said, "Don't killed the messanger. I'm just telling you what  
it says."  
Dk'myr'chi didn't reply. He had a furrowed brow and was standing there,   
peering at the faulty readouts over her shoulder as he lost himself in thought.  
Then, without saying a word to her--as usual, she thought--he started  
toward one of the conduits that ran into the wall. He snagged a tool box from  
a nearby bench as he walked briskly toward it.  
She hustled to catch up, "What're you doing?"  
He explained what he thought was the problem to her as he walked,  
using technical terms she hadn't heard since her Acadamy days. In short,  
plain english, he believed that a couple of systems had overloaded and vaporized,  
taking out vital components.  
She grabbed her own tool box and squirmed into a conduit that ran at an  
odd upward angle next to his. If he was right, they were in quite a bit of trouble.  
She wrenched a panel off of the wall and grimanced as the ozone smell  
of burned circuts hit her, like a smack in the face.   
Half of the circuts were charred beyond repair. Most of the rest seemed to  
be intact, but those critical few were all that were needed to hamper the warp drive.  
Her badge chirped and she tapped it, saying "DePaul here."  
Dk'myr'chi's voice came over. "I found a burned-out system over here. You?"  
"More of the same, I'm afraid." She said, "It'll take time to fix."  
"Times the one thing we don't have. If you can't handle it, get Rodrequiz to help  
you."  
She bit back a sharp reply about his low estimation of her abilities and said instead,  
"I can handle it...'sir'. I'll work as fast as I can."  
Dk'myr'chi grunted and set to work.  
  
  
  


There were Jem'Hadar fighters everywhere!  
Toyle could barely move fast enough to dodge the  
dozens of enemy ships that spun about in space. It seemed every time he  
fired, he hit SOMETHING.  
Unfortunatly, for all the skill of the Pheonix-squadron, they could  
not stop some of the bug-like ships from getting past them and assualting the  
Khitomer. Toyle was trying to take them out when he could, but there were just  
too many of them for him to handle! The Khitomer was taking more and more damage  
with every new ship that slipped through. Toyle felt a sudden panic seize his chest   
as he realized that the Khitomer and all 345 crewmembers onboard might die  
because of him!   
And now, with the possibility for failure looming over him, he flew harder and  
faster than ever before, draining power from the shields and targeting systems into  
his engines as he tried to be everywhere at once.  
Just before his sensors dimmed, he saw a group of five Jem'Hadar warships  
slowly lumbering toward the battle.  
If they joined, the Khitomer and the Pheonix-class fighters would most  
definitly die.  
  
  
  


DePaul was thrown against the wall of the conduit as another mighty  
blast rocked the Khitomer. She winced, feeling another bruise already forming  
on her shoulder. She spread her legs, trying to brace herself against the walls  
of the conduit, but it seemed to do very little good as each blast was harder  
than the last.  
She was slowly replacing the circuts with new ones, but it was a slow  
and painstaking process. From Engineering, she heard a muffled explosion,  
then a constant hissing sound.  
Dk'myr'chi, having completed the major repairs, slid out of his tube and  
saw the plasma spilling out in gaseous form into Engineering from a ruptured  
pipe.  
He filled his lungs with air and bellowed, "Everyone out! Move, move, MOVE!  
C'mon, people! Evacuate Engineering!"  
Dk'myr'chi took off running for the enterance, seeing Rodrequiz fall in beside  
him. They tore out, then kept running, trying to get through all the hatches that would  
come down momentarily.  
Suddenly Dk'myr'chi slowed and stopped, turning back to face the Engineering  
area that was rapidly filling with toxic plasma. Horror filled his countenance.  
"DePaul..." He whispered under his breath. He turned and charged back into  
Engineering.  
She was still inside the conduit, working with all due haste.  
He reached inside and grabbed her feet, shouting as he pulled, "DePaul! C'mon,  
we've gotta get outta here! This whole place is filling with plasma! For Djinn's sake, c'mon!"   
"Not yet!" She shouted back, using one hand to anchor herself inside the  
conduit. "I'm almost done."  
"DePaul, blast it, NOW! That's an order!"  
She ignored him, working as fast as she could. She was almost done...  
The plasma was surrounding Dk'myr'chi now, choking him. He drew a deep  
breath and held it, pulling as hard as he could on her feet, trying to get her out.  
The last circut fell into place. The system readouts changed from red  
to green as it came back on-line. The engines thrummed to life. DePaul hit her badge,  
coughing as the plasma leaked into the conduit she was in.  
"DePaul to bridge! Engines on-line!"  
Edwards' voice said, "Good work," Then cut off.  
She released her grip and slid out of the conduit, stumbling beside Dk'myr'chi  
as they tried to get out of the Engineering area. Up ahead, she could see the   
mighty hatches sliding downward.  
The plasma was too much for her. With a final fit of coughing, she doubled over  
and collapsed on the deck, unable to will her muscles to carry her any farther.  
Dk'myr'chi scooped her limp form up in his arms and staggered toward the  
hatches. They were sliding lower, lower, still lower...  
With a running leap, he flew beneath them and hit the deck hard on his back,  
trying to keep DePaul from skidding on the deck too hard. His head hit the wall and  
he winced painfully, nearly losing conciousness.   
He groggily set DePaul down beside him, leaning her against the wall,  
then sagged back, eyes closed, trying to get rid of the burning sensation in his eyes from  
the plasma.  
Doctor Susan Woods was already on the scene with her staff, working to help  
those Engineers who had inhaled dangerous amounts of onto floating bed to be taken  
back to Sickbay.  
As Woods scanned Dk'myr'chi and DePaul, then injected them both with a sedative,  
Dk'myr'chi mumbled "...DePaul...?"  
She managed to grunt questioningly in reply.  
He said, "Good job..." Just before he passed out.  
She barely heard him as the sedative took its hold on her.  
  


***  
  
  
  


"Tell Toyle to retreat back to Federation space!" Edwards snapped,  
glad the Pheonix-class fighters were warp-capable. "And get us out of here."  
Zetan punched in a hasty course, not wanting to accidentally fly any  
deeper into Dominion space, and his the 'Engage' button.  
The stars elongated to lines and the Khitomer shot into warp with a  
silent bang, followed by the Pheonix-class fighters and a half-dozen fighters  
who were firing wildly, trying to destroy the Khitomer before it made it to Federation   
space.  
Zetan started rattling off numbers. "Thirty seconds to Federation space....  
Twenty-five...twenty....fifteen..."  
Edwards held his breath, the tension on the bridge almost unbearable.   
"...ten...five, four, three, two, one. We're across!"  
From either side, two Federation starships swooped into formation with  
the Khitomer, firing menacingly at the Jem'Hadar ships. Sensing they had lost  
their prey, the fighters turned and swooped away.  
"Drop us out of warp," Edwards said. "Bring the Pheonix fighters back onboard.  
Thank the captains of those ships for coming to our aid."  
Hobson sighed noisily and looked at Edwards with an expression of  
relief.  
As he sagged back in his seat, Edwards uttered a single sentance that  
seemed to instantly dispell all the tension.  
"We made it."  
  


***  
  
  
  


Captain's Log, Stardate: 53768.4.  


The repairs are nearly completed to all the damaged components on-board  
the Khitomer. Dimitri has assured me that the shield system will not blow out again. He  
has replaced almost all of the faulty circuts with new ones. The Khitomer is almost  
up to full running order.  
Originaly, we planned to put back to spacedock for repairs, but Admiral  
Hendrickson called just about ten minutes ago and said we were needed in the  
Courionous system to assist in the fight against the Dominion.  
No rest for the weary, I suppose.  
We're currently en route, ETA: three hours.   
I wish we could've returned to the Anteries system to see how the system's  
inhabitants are faring. The last report I recived said that almost all of the Jem'Hadar  
had either been killed or captured. Even Mr. Radisson couldn't tell me much. He and  
his men met us at Starbase 32. When we were ordered to the Courionous system, I  
guess he was told to meet us there. He didn't have anymore information than I did.  
Well, maybe when the fighting quiets down a bit, I'll ask Hendrickson. I'm  
sure he knows.  
End Log.  
  
  
  


After setting course for the Courionous system, Edwards and the  
rest of the battle-weary senior staff retired to the Officer's Louge to relax for a few  
hours until they were thrown into the war again.   
Edwards sat hunched over a table, a cup of steaming black coffee held   
between his hands. He smiled tiredly, looking at the other senior officers who were  
gathered around the same table.  
"Well," He said, "We survived the first major crisis. That's a good sign."  
"Yeah," Radisson put in, "Now all we have to do is survive the war, and  
we'll be all set."  
Woods chuckled--the first time Edwards had seen her do anything besides  
growl, he realized--and said, "Oh, that's all."  
Toyle leaned back, tipping his chair onto the back legs. "Don't worry, folks." He  
said, "As long as I'm around, you've got nothing to worry about."  
That ellicited a dry chuckle from everyone. Edwards spoke again.  
"I know most of you didn't really want to be here at first, and I don't know if   
you've changed your mind since then. I just want to say that I'm glad I have you  
people for my senior staff. You are some of the best officers I have served with in  
a long time. I don't think we could've survived the Battle for Anteries if we hadn't  
been working together on this one. I talked to Admiral Nechayev a little earlier, and  
she said that we could probably get you reassigned to whatever posts you want after  
the war's over--assuming we survive, of course. But until then, we're going to have to  
work together."  
Hobson said quietly, speaking for all of them, "Don't worry, captain. We're  
with you all the way."  
Edwards grinned and said, "Thanks." Then he craned his neck, looking  
around for a moment. "Where's Dimitri? I thought he was going to join us."  
Radisson said, "I talked to him earlier. He said he had to take care of  
something first. Said he'd be here a little later."  
  
  
  


Heads turned to stare as Lieutenant Commander Dk'myr'chi stomped  
into Engineering, wearing a bulky Extra-Vehicular suit over his normal uniform  
and carrying a tool belt specially designed for EV repairs.  
DePaul--fully recovered, although she still had a nasty cut on one cheek  
that was slowly healing--moved to walk beside him. She tapped her badge,   
opening a channel to his internal comm and said, "What're you doing, sir?"  
He didn't answer her. Instead, he clanked up to a control panel and started  
pushing buttons clumsily through his thick gloves.  
Red lights started flashing through Engineering and the computer chirped  
calmly, "Atmospheric decompression in one minute."  
Dk'myr'chi stood there, staring mutely at the warp core as DePaul and  
everyone else in Engineering hastily tore out the main doors, sealing them once  
they were out. DePaul peered through a window into Engineering, watching as  
the vents sucked all the air out of Engineering and cut the gravity. Dk'myr'chi  
engaged his magnetic boots, then clomped over to a conduit. Specifically,  
the one he had tried to work on three times prior. Each time, he had been  
disturbed, and each time, he had hit his head on the ceiling of the conduit.   
With a contented sigh, he set to work, knowing that this time, there  
would be NO interruptions...  
  


THE END

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